


prologus

by Rethira



Category: Final Fantasy IV
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-08
Updated: 2013-10-08
Packaged: 2017-12-28 21:04:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/996687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rethira/pseuds/Rethira
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The beginning of the White Queen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	prologus

**Author's Note:**

> a while ago, [colette](durendals.tumblr.com/) prompted me "an au in which baron's nobility doesn't accept cecil as a king, and after a coup d'etat/a brief civil war he gets dethroned and assassinated"
> 
> that led to a long discussion of the world that would result from such an event, and we were left with the White Queen Rosa AU
> 
> this is the beginning of that au

The war is, thankfully, brief.

 

There’s a summer retreat a short way from Baron. They place him under house arrest there, and station a great many guards to make sure he can’t escape. It’s very boring. Cecil wonders where Rosa is. How she is. He tries protesting that they’re married, and surely he should be allowed to live out the rest of his days with his wife. The nobles don’t listen to him.

It gets very cold in winter, and the guards get very irritable. Also, Cecil thinks, they regrettably become less interested in the business of guarding.

He doesn’t recognise the man who enters; they struggle briefly, but fortune sees them at the top of the stairs. Cecil overbalances, falls.

The assassin doesn’t even have the good grace to kill Cecil afterwards. He just leaves Cecil there on the floor, unable to move. How dreadfully rude of him, Cecil manages to think, through the pain. How dreadfully, dreadfully rude.

 

“Your husband is dead,” they tell her.

Rosa sits down heavily at the table. Her hands are shaking. One of the guards moves closer, sits down. He’s always been compassionate, this one. The kindest of them, and Rosa wonders if she doesn’t hate him more than all the rest.

“I’m sorry,” he says, reaching to clasp her shoulder.

She sinks a knife into his stomach. The other guards cry out when he falls out of his chair, but it’s too late; Rosa’s already moving. She’s faster than they are, and they’re relaxed in any case – one of them grabs her arm and she slashes at his fingers with her knife, ignores the subsequent scream. When she gets to the staircase she jumps, and as soon as she hits the bottom she’s running to the next set of stairs and the next after that.

There’s more yelling behind her, but the window on the first floor is open; she jumps through it and lands in the moat with a splash. She doesn’t bother with the old waterway – instead she climbs the embankment, knife clenched between her teeth, and starts to run again. An arrow flies past her head and another after that.

There are cries of “Stop her!” from behind, but none of them succeed.

 

It takes Rosa months to reach Damcyan; Edward embraces her, strokes her hair gently and murmurs quietly and Rosa finally lets herself _weep_.

She doesn’t remember being put to bed. She wakes up in a luxuriously furnished room, a nurse sitting quietly at the end of the bed. When Rosa goes to rise, the nurse hushes her and sends for the maidservants – “Let us take care of you,” the nurse says, setting about preparing a bath and clothes. The water is perfectly warm, and the maidservant gentle when she helps Rosa bathe.

The dress she’s given to wear is fine white silk, long and proper; a mourning gown. The nurse clucks her tongue and sends for a veil as well – “Past time for you to have been wearing one,” she murmurs, but Rosa’s hardly had time to observe the correct mourning practices. Only once the veil is properly fastened does the nurse nod in satisfaction.

The nurse and maidservants curtsey and Rosa leaves the room, her head held high.

 

The wedding happens only a short time later; there are appalled murmurs when Rosa arrives, still dressed in mourning white, but they are drowned out by the sounds of celebration.

Edward’s hand is tight in Rosa’s – for a moment, Rosa almost feels happy.

But the moment doesn’t last, and Rosa’s eyes turn eagerly towards Baron.

 

Yang shakes his head and says, “No. No, Fabul will not join you in this war.”

Rosa holds her tongue. It has been the same reaction everywhere; Troia said no, even when Edward asked. Edge had frowned and ducked his head, before saying, “I cannot pledge any of my men to your cause. Eblan will remain neutral.” Mysidia had sent her away, with only a promise to send medical supplies as needed and that- that wasn’t _enough_.

“Soon,” Edward murmurs, his fingers clasped tightly with hers. “We’ll be ready soon.”

 

On the eve of war, Rydia arrives with weapons from the dwarves. “I told them you’ll pay for them,” she says, and then reveals that she’s forbidden from summoning. “They say that this is not a matter for Eidolons to be involved in.” Rydia shrugs. “So I join you as a mage only.”

Rosa tells Rydia it’s enough, just that she’s there, that she’s willing to help Rosa right this- this _injustice_.

It has to be enough.

 

She had thought that the rulers of Baron – the faux rulers, the usurpers, the _murderers_ – would hold out for a siege. But Baron’s gates open wide and a flood of soldiers pour out. People Rosa’s known all her life stand amongst them, people Rosa might have spared, once.

Edward strides into battle ahead of her. “We’re almost there,” he murmurs as he leaves. “Soon we’ll retake Baron.” Rydia’s already gone ahead, leading a platoon of foot soldiers, her magic clearing a path for them. Rosa stays back with the archers; she tends the wounded as they come, and many a soldier revives from near-death to the face of his queen.

There’s an explosion from the east wing; Rosa turns to watch as an airship tries to take off... and fails. It slams into the castle wall and there are screams from both sides. Rosa hands out medical supplies, sends some of the white mages to assist and then turns her eyes back to the main body of the battle.

Something glints in the sky and slams down into the earth, and Rosa’s fought long enough beside Kain to know it’s him. A feeling like relief blooms in her chest, and then there is a desperate cry of, “Lady Rosa! You must hurry! It is the King!”

 

“I did love you,” Edward tells her. He smiles. There’s blood on his lips. “We could have been happy.”

 

The war was mercifully brief.


End file.
